HumanWare, makers of the popular Brailliant braille displays that come in 32, 40 and 80 cells, have announced a smaller model of the display called the Brailliant 14.

Hardware and Features

This device contains the following hardware specifications. There is an 8-dot braille keyboard and a 14-cell braille display. Across the front of the display, there are the four HumanWare signature thumb keys found on all of their other Braille products.

One unique feature of this display is that there is a touch strip above the braille cells rather than physical cursor routing buttons. To use this touch strip, you simply slide your finger above the braille cell that you want to move your cursor to, and the cursor will be moved to that position in your document.

The display also has the ability to connect 5 Bluetooth devices and 1USB device via its micro USB port. That, again, is something we have seen in other products like the Baum VarioUltra and the HIMS Smart Beetle.

Here is where this device differs. The display features a built-in editor that one can take notes in without being connected to any device. Then, when you pair your iOS device back to this display, if you have the brailliant sync app set up, all notes that you take on the brailliant will go back into iOS and your Gmail account.

This is, on the surface, an interesting concept. With this feature, one can take notes in a meeting and not have to worry about Bluetooth or Apple’s translation issues. After your notes are synchronized back to your Gmail account, one can access them on any number of mainstream devices. With a 15 to 20-hour battery life, taking notes for an extended period is now a snap. A user wouldn’t have to worry about suffering battery issues on the display or on the iOS device, since Bluetooth would not be a factor.

The Future Of Braille

We are entering into interesting times as far as Braille. We not only have this product coming out, but we have the new Orbit Reader 20 produced by the Transforming Braille Group, which will be below $500.00, not to mention a new 16 cell option coming out from Handy Tech, the Actilino, which will be distributed in the US by Triumph Technology.

The market as far as braille displays is getting very competitive, starting as low as under $500.00. It will be interesting to see this new HumanWare display and how it will fare in the market. I plan to attend the 2017 NFB convention, and I am sure I will get to check out this display and have some hands on with this product.

At this point, no pricing or a release date has been set for this product. To learn more, see the link below, which will take you to the HumanWare web page for more information.